


under control

by Omeganixtra



Series: Destiny Fictober 2019 [16]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: F/M, Fictober 2019, cayde worries once more, fallen mercenaries is a thing, meera keeps getting shot at, mission gone wrong (again), more buds of love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-27 16:49:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21122057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omeganixtra/pseuds/Omeganixtra
Summary: “I am not Andal.”





	under control

**Author's Note:**

> day 16: “Listen. No, really listen.”

“We have to do something.”

Cayde has seen some shit over the years, that’s for sure, but somehow the expression on Zalli’s face still makes him do a doubletake. The Titan is bent over the incident report in front of him, grinding his teeth and looking downright _murderous_ enough that Cayde’s just about willing to take a chance and say that whatever happened out there in space ain’t exactly been a walk in the park.

“You mind telling me what actually happened out there before we start rainin’ death and destruction upon the masses, hmm?” Cayde drawls and leans back against the table, glancing at Zalli to the side. “You wouldn’t have asked for a private debrief without a real good reason.”

He waits patiently and watches as Zalli paces back and forth in the debriefing room. There’s just something oddly unnerving about seeing an absolute _giant_ of an Awoken pace and snarl like an animal in tight spaces. Not that Cayde’s ever going to admit to thinking that.

“Meera is in medical,” Zalli finally relinquishes and Cayde feels as if something has gone inside of him and pulled out his reactor. Meera’s teammate just looks absolutely sick to his stomach. “She got shot.”

“She’s a Guardian,” Cayde snaps out, anger the only defense that he can come up with on such a short notice. “We get shot at, it’s practically part of the deal.”

Zalli shakes his head. “No, no—this was different, Sir. Something was… _off_ about this whole thing.”

“What were you fighting?”

“Fallen,” the Titan spits out that one singular word as if it is poison. “But something was different about them.”

Cayde twists around, facing Zalli directly now.

“Different?” he repeats. “Whaddya mean ‘different’?”

“Strange behavior,” Zalli shakes his head. “Strange tactics. Mee got unlucky and took a shot to the side. We dragged her behind cover, checked to see if everything was clear and called out her Ghost. Some sneaky fucker somehow got behind us and almost managed to shoot him.”

“So what happened? You said that Meera’s in the medical.”

“She swiped him aside just in time and got the shot herself. Only thing now is that it_ won’t heal_.”

Zalli grips the edge of the table strong enough to warp the metal slightly. Cayde can’t really blame him, he’s seconds away from doing the very same shit.

“The shot,” he forces out through a mostly-uncooperative voice box. “What did it look like?”

“Whirling smoke,” Zalli chokes out with a bent head. “It was… it was _green_, and not just any kind of green, but the same sickly kind you’d expect from out of the Hive and their fucked up magics.”

“We need Ikora on this,” Cayde shakes his head. “We need Ikora and we need Eris in on this—between the two of’em this shouldn’t be too difficult to figure out.”

“What, you don’t know what this is? I thought that you were supposed to be the resident ‘Fallen Expert’.”

“Got a hunch, can’t be sure yet,” Cayde answers blithely and fishes out one of his knives. He flips it in the air and catches it by the rounded handle. “‘S a good hunch, though.”

“You mind sharing?”

If it is even possible, Cayde’s stance turns even more rigid that it already is.

“Mercenaries,” he spits. “The Fallen have done it before, I’ve seen it myself.”

“You’re talking about the Taniks situation.”

Cayde nods. His hand tightens around the handle of his knife.

“Guardian Shornell?”

The sound of a frame has Zalli twist away from Cayde instantly and he looks expectantly at the newcomer. “Yes?”

“The medical personnel have finished operating on Guardian Quill. As per instructions I have been sent to inform you.”

“Received,” Zalli bites out and is out of the room in seconds.

Cayde follows straight after.

The walk down to medical is achingly familiar. Almost feels just like the last time that he found her down here, although this time they have the advantage of Meera actually _not_ being in a drugged coma.

Cayde still just about shortcircuits when he sees her on the hospital bed with wires stuck to her arms and a tube going into her nose. To Cayde, she looks scarily frail as she lies there, breathing shallowly and looking too small for the pasty white, sterile room.

Zalli is by her side in moments, holding her hand in his and muttering nonsense too low for Cayde’s audio sensors to pick up. Whatever it is that the Titan is saying seems to wake her up from the slumber that she was busy with, but the smile on Zalli’s face that appears upon seeing her eyes open up slowly is almost bright enough for Cayde to avert his eyes.

Only almost, though. Brat’s got another thing coming if he thinks that he can hog all of his favorite Guardian’s attention for long.

She must have caught a glimpse of him because suddenly her droopy, drug-addled eyes are on him and Cayde really can’t stop himself from giving her a bright grin upon getting eye contact with her

“Hey…”

Her voice sounds like a rusty door hinge.

“Hey yourself, kid,” Cayde smiles and crosses his arms as he looks down overbearingly at her. “Thought that we agreed on not meeting up here anymore. Y’know, I got other baby Hunters to smother with attention, right?”

“Really?” she tries to snark back at him, the dear little girl. “I wasn’t aware that you… had more favorites…”

“Shh! Not so loud!” he shushes her and manages to coax a smile from her tired, pale lips.

“Are you okay, Mee?” Zalli beckons and rests a hand on top of her cheek. It looks too colorful, too otherworldly lilac against her powder-pale pink skin.

Cayde refuses to acknowledge the desire to smack it away.

“I will be,” she nods and glances at Zalli briefly before she closes her eyes again. “I’m just… tired.”

“No kidding,” he huffs and the hand on her cheek moves to smooth out her hair instead. “You got the short end of the stick out there.”

“Tora?”

Zalli’s smile grows larger. “He’s busy worrying his mind to pieces, probably. One of the frames should have given him the news that you’re alright now, but I suppose that it might not be able to find him.”

“Few rarely do if he doesn’t want them to,” she notes and gives him a pointed look. The severity of it all is completely shot to Hell and back when her eyes flicker to Cayde.

“Alright, alright,” the Titan huffs and steps away from her bedside. “I see when I’m not wanted. Vanguard, I will wait until we have time to properly discuss the debriefing.”

“Of course,” Cayde nods and gives Zalli a half-hearted salute in dismissal. “I’ll have my Ghost forward details on when would be the best time to meet. Now, go soothe your Warlock before he makes something explode and gets the blame placed on me.”

“Aye-aye, sir,” Zalli chuckles and walks out of the sickroom, although not before sending Meera another grateful look.

The silence that fills the sickroom is almost thick enough to choke him.

“Traveler above, Meera.”

He moves closer, sits on her bedside and one hand bunches up the white, pristine sheets. Meera maintains eye contact with him for all of ten seconds before she breaks off and instead looks to the side.

“I know, _I know_, alright?” she sighs. “I wasn’t careful, I risked my Ghost. It never should have happened.”

“No, it shouldn’t have,” he agrees. “You can bet your ass it shouldn’t.”

“I didn’t even see it,” she mutters and for a moment her eyes go blank as she stares off to the side. “I never even _heard_ it, and then my Ghost is screaming. Cayde, he—he was _screaming_!”

“Listen,” he begins and reaches over to wrap a hand around her shoulder. “No, really listen.”

She glances at him from out of the corner of her eye. “What?”

Cayde swallows. “You—you’ve taken down _gods_, Meera. Gods and Vex and Kells—it doesn’t seem to matter what the universe decide to throw your way. You kick it to death and spit in its wounds without so much as a by-your-leave, and doin’ things like that is bound to have consequences.”

“What, are you saying that they’re sending out _hitmen_?”

“They’ve done it before,” he shrugs and motions towards himself. “I’m proof of that.”

“I had it under control.”

“Maybe in the beginning of it all, but if it weren’t for Shornell and Solaris pullin’ all of you outta there, you’d all be strung up as dead warnings to anyone passin’ by out there,” he says and the hand around her shoulder tightens momentarily. “You’d all be dead by now.”

“I am not Andal.”

Cayde stiffens, goes completely stiff and rigid at her words and his hand is off her as if burnt.

“I never sai—"

“Cayde, do _you_ hear me?” she interrupts him and sits up, hissing when something is unintentionally pulled. “I am _not_ Andal Brask. I made a mistake today, I know that, but I won’t repeat it. You will never have to bury me the same way that you did with him. The Darkness will take us all before I allow for that to happen.”

He refuses to look her in the eye. If he does, then it’ll just make everything happening right now real, and he is sure as fuck not ready to deal with that just yet.

“I know,” he chokes out. “I know you’re not.”

“Then please,” she whispers and takes his hand in hers this time, squeezing hard. “Have a little faith. I won’t come back in a coffin, you have my word.”

He nods. Somehow, he manages to not look like a complete wreck, but he does it. Meera gives him another one of those smiles.

It’ll be okay. It has to, after all, because she _promised_.


End file.
